Varieties of English: why is it important for students to know that

As you know, English is one of the most spread languages worldwide and is a state language in a very large number of countries not to mention its popularity as a second state language in different partners of the world. Such spread of English has 2 main reasons behind it: it is the language of technology and the language of science. A lot of scientific papers, methodologies, books and educational materials are published in English and then translated globally which rises its demand day by day.

When talking about the varieties of the English language we should mention that though the language itself is pretty unanimous and uniform, there are still some varieties in spelling, pronunciation and syntax which create dialects and accents.

Geographically, English accents are distributed the following way:

Let’s look at some of the most famous varieties of English: British and American ones which are also very popular when teaching English as a foreign language and/or communicating with people from all over the world.

1. British English and American English

You must have heard about RP (Received Pronunciation) which is conventionally considered the standard accent of people living in London and the southeast of England and all the other people sharing that accent. RP was one of the dialects of the English language which has become ‘prestigious’ throughout history. However, it doesn’t mean that the other dialects are considered lower in status. It is just a common term to refer to the language spoken by the educated people who had made their stance in history. BBC English, the Queen’s English are RP.

In the British Isles, the Englishes differ as well in some accents and varieties of pronunciation. In the words run, rung, and tongue, the RP pronunciation of the vowel is pronounced like u in but; in some Northern accents, it is pronounced like the oo in book.

American English is probably more widespread nowadays due to the big range of movies and cinema activities worldwide. It is the federal language and is de facto the state language of the country due to being so widespread. Inside America, there are also many varieties of accents and dialects like Mexican English, South American English, etc.

All of us would agree that most of the fun happens when we start contrasting these two types of Englishes — British and American. Let’s look at some differences.

Spelling

• In British English the final consonant is doubled when adding an ending, like:
  BrE — travelling, AmE — traveling
• Similarly, the British -our endings become -or in American.
  BrE — colour, AmE — color
• British English changes a «C» to an «S» to distinguish a noun from a verb.
  BrE — defence, AmE — defense
• American English changes the «S» to a more phonetic «Z» in some endings.
  BrE — analyse, organise, AmE — analyze, organize

Grammar

There are some slight differences in grammar and usage, which may be interesting if one is studying or teaching English; however, they almost never create confusion. Some irregular verbs are spelt differently in British vs. American English.

BrE — dreamt, learnt, AmE — dreamed, learned

Pronunciation

Differences are a bit more in pronunciation when the word stress changes based on which English you use. Here are a couple of examples:

• advertisement
• schedule
• often
• Data

Lexis

The most fun happens when people get confused in the word stock differences of these two dialects. Let’s have a look at some most popular words and phrases.

2. Other varieties

Other varieties of English include Indian English — quite widespread use of the language thanks to the development of the IT world, Canadian, New Zealandia, Australia Englishes and many more.

All of the varieties have their peculiarities in all forms of the language and it is important for the students to know this. It gives them a chance to be ready for communication with people from different nationalities and learn in a more structured way.

Why should students know about these varieties?

It will be fair to say that there are as many varieties of the language as there are people learning it. This number definitely exceeds the number of native speakers already. Learning the varieties of the same language has several benefits for the students:

• It boosts cultural awareness of the learners and develops their interpersonal skills. As we know, language is the basis of culture. It is through a language that people get to know people from different parts of the world. It helps the learners to see the world from the perspectives of other speakers of the same language. It increases background knowledge as the more cultures you socialize with the richer your understanding of the world.
• It helps to ease language acquisition. Knowing which variety your students are learning will help them assimilate the rules of the language easier and faster through comparison and contrast.
• It will help them to be ready for different usages of the language as they progress through life. It will be very helpful for them when starting to work with international colleagues, companies, etc. It is not a secret that people struggle with some accents and find it hard to communicate their ideas or understand the interlocutor when those are using a different variety of the same language.

To sum up, the more languages/varieties of the same language you know, the better chances you have to succeed in business and climb the career ladder.